BANQUET GUEST SPEAKER

Dr. Ali Dehghantanha

Professor of Cybersecurity and Threat Intelligence, University of Guelph

Hear how to be prepared when a cyber attack happens and the steps that producers can take to control their own farm’s vulnerability.

Cutting-edge technology including; automated feeding systems, robotic tools with precise calibrations, remote-access surveillance systems, and intricate datasets spanning generations are just some of the valuable technical assets on many Canadian dairy farms. But what if hackers brought your whole enterprise to a standstill?

Financial assets are the most obvious target for hackers, but for farms, the consequences could be even more disastrous. Shutting down a barn’s systems could quickly become deadly for livestock without temperature control or automated feeding systems. Medical, genealogical, and productivity data could all be erased or tampered with, and untangling these databases could easily take years.

Supporting farmers to prevent, manage, and recover from cybersecurity attacks has become a passion of Dr. Ali Dehghantanha. As an Associate Professor in the School of Computer Science at U of G and founding Director of the Cyber Science Lab, the Canadian Cyber Foundry, and the Master of Cybersecurity and Threat Intelligence Program, Dr. Dehghantanha has a wealth of knowledge and continues to provide cybersecurity resources for the agricultural sector.